BOU AVENUETangle Ridge
Looking to bag one more peak before the end of the year, I teamed up with
Linda Breton on 31 December 2005 to scramble up Tangle Ridge in Jasper
National Park. Choking down breakfast, Linda was tearing her place
apart looking for her wind pants when I came knocking at her door at 6:00
AM. Combined with a lack of sleep for both of us, it was
an inauspicious start to the day, but we eventually found her pants and
soon were on our way to the mountains. Reaching the town of Banff,
we made a pit stop at the Shell gas station where Linda had to contend
with a slow and possibly incoherent man occupying the women's washroom.
She eventually tired of waiting and went across the street to use the
washroom at the Petro Canada gas station instead. When we finally
hit the road again, Linda ate a chocolate bar and washed it down with a
can of Red Bull; she was now ready for some serious scrambling!

A
lengthy drive had us at the Tangle Falls trail head a little after 10:00
AM, and we backtracked a bit on the highway to survey the scramble route.
Despite the upper mountain being plastered with snow, the snow pack
looked shallow and unthreatening. We returned to the trail head and
geared up. The trail to Wilcox Pass was packed down and easy to
hike. At the turnoff, we crossed Tangle Creek and broke trail
through ankle-deep snow while following a series of cairns up the
forested slope. Once we broke out of the trees, the remainder of
the ascent was simply a long but easy slog up gentle, snow-covered
slopes. Although it probably was not absolutely necessary, we
donned our crampons at one point to give us better traction on some of
the windblown sections of snow. When Linda and I finally reached
the summit, an icy wind chilled us to the bone, and we only stayed long
enough to snap a few requisite photographs. The sun rapidly
disappeared as we descended the same route, but aside from the usual
stumbling in the dark forest (Linda actually snapped a tree branch with
one of her eyes), we encountered no serious problems on our way back to
the trail head (round-trip time under 8 hours).

On the drive home, I decided to return to the Shell gas station in
Banff to refuel my car. At the outskirts of town, we were briefly
held up by a police check-stop, and just as we were allowed through,
lights began flashing at a railroad crossing only a short distance down
the road. I probably could have zipped past the descending
barricades, but with police nearby, I thought better of it and stopped my
car much to the chagrin of Linda and her hungry stomach.
Thankfully, the train was not overly long, and we were soon at the gas
station where Linda washed my car's headlights and windshield before
treating herself to a bag of potato chips. After gassing up my car,
we drove to the nearby town of Canmore in search of fast food restaurants
that were still open. We ended up getting some delicious burgers
from A&W but not before being held up again at another railroad crossing
by the same train!

Thus ended my most successful year of peak-bagging to date.
Here's hoping 2006 will be even better!